regarded with suspicion by some loud voices on the left

the transcript of which later leaked

all-staff memo

These and other moves by Bennet to enliven his pages

as he revamps and modernizes the Times opinion section

But he does give a damn.

During the election you had no strong advocate for [Sen.] Bernie Sanders [I-Vt.], or any of those positions. And so I guess, in the more recent months, in your attempts to find those voices, where have you been looking, what types of people have you been looking for, and how are you trying to get a more diverse group of people regularly writing in the op-ed section?

So we’re doubling down on our partnerships with academics, technology companies and other partners.

In the US, we recently announced a partnership with The Associated Press to use their reporters in all 50 states to identify and debunk false and misleading stories related to the federal, state and local US midterm elections.

We use the information from fact-checkers to train our machine learning model, so that we can catch more potentially false news stories and do so faster.

to predict potentially false stories for fact-checkers to review.

our partnership with third-party fact-checking organizations. We’re seeing progress in our ability to limit the spread of articles rated false by fact-checkers, and we’re scaling our efforts.

Tessa Lyons, Product Manager

every person of conviction makes a bargain by going to work for Trump: to wield the levers of power, to make changes you believe are for the better, you will have to make certain compromises

The conviction among his critics that Sessions is racist has sometimes led them to overreach. In February, a Democratic Senator and the American Civil Liberties Union blasted him for referring to the “Anglo-American heritage of law enforcement” in a speech. It was a factual description, one Obama had used on many occasions. But in explaining it to me, Sessions couldn’t resist a detour into cultural stereotypes. “I believe the American legal system, which clearly developed out of England, is a wonder of the world, and it’s based on the fact that lady justice is blindfolded,” he said. “When you go and travel like I have–to Kosovo, to Afghanistan, to Iraq–where we’ve invested huge amounts of money and effort to export our legal system to a culture that’s totally unfamiliar with it, it doesn’t work. It’s because it requires a degree of trust and respect, education and maybe even a cultural predisposition.”

Sessions seemed exasperated when I asked him to address the disproportionate impact of harsh policing and incarceration on black families and communities. He cited the work of Heather Mac Donald, the controversial conservative scholar who argues that racial bias in the criminal-justice system is a myth and that the real problem is a “war on cops.”

Sessions’ liberal critics agree that he’s been remarkably effective.

Is Winning

pulling back from police oversight and civil rights enforcement and pushing a hard-line approach to drugs, gangs and immigration violations

rescinded the Obama Administration’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program and reversed its stances on voting rights and transgender rights

a maximalist approach to prosecuting and jailing criminals

which information the possessor has reason to believe could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation

more wars, and soon

“He ran on a campaign that said very nice things about me.

"He ran on a campaign that said very nice things about me.

“He ran on a campaign that said very nice things about me.

“He ran on a campaign that said very nice things about me.

He ran on a campaign that said very nice things about me.

“He ran on a campaign that said very nice things about me,”

‘He ran on a campaign that said very nice things about me.

And last night, the young man also, h e ran on a campaign, he said very nice things about me.

Over the next six months, Democratic voters will be asked again and again whether their party’s candidates should hew to the center or move to the left.

Should Democrats Embrace the Center or Abandon It?

But the liberal establishment’s fixation on Facebook’s 2016 sins — first the transmission of fake news and now the exploitation of its data by the Trump campaign or its appendages — still feels like a classic example of blaming something new because it’s new when it’s the old thing that mattered more. Or of blaming something new because you thought that “new” meant “good,” that the use of social-media data by campaigns would always help tech-savvy liberals and not their troglodytic rivals — and the shock of discovering otherwise obscures the more important role that older forms of media played in making the Trump era a reality.

The Embrace Of Torture

DiGenova and Trump share the view that a faction inside the FBI sought to frame Trump.

President Trump’s attorneys have provided the special counsel’s office with written descriptions that chronicle key moments under investigation in hopes of curtailing the scope of a presidential interview, according to two people familiar with the situation.

Trump’s lawyers hope the evidence eliminates the need to ask the president about some episodes.

Special counsel investigators have told Trump’s lawyers that their main questions about the president fall into two simple categories, the two people said: “What did he do?” and “What was he thinking when he did it?”

But his lawyers, who are carefully negotiating the terms of a sit-down, recognize the extraordinarily high stakes.

famously fickle

says the flu vaccine is laced with cancer-causing ingredients.

“The president is concerned about the viability of this project and the fact that New York and New Jersey have no skin in the game.”

"The President is concerned about the viability of this project and the fact that New York and New Jersey have no skin in the game."

Blur

“Me and All The Trump Supporter Celebrities Decide To Make A Company Named “Celebrities For Trump”,

“Me and All The Trump Supporter Celebrities Decide To Make A Company Named “Celebrities For Trump”

Even pessimists acknowledged that Trump’s hard line against Pyongyang, after decades of less forceful U.S. effort, played a significant role in moving one of the world’s most vexing and threatening problems in a potentially positive direction.

Understanding Student Mobbists

the edifice of civilizations is a great gift, which our ancestors gave their lives for

they ALL wound up waist deep in blood

If I could talk to the students

the oppressed masses have to mobilize to storm the barricades

The solutions to injustice and suffering are simple and obvious: Defeat the powerful.

If reason and deliberation are central to democracy, how on earth did Donald Trump get elected?

an educational ideology that taught them that individual reason and emotion were less important than perspectivism

reason, apparently, ceased to matter.

Progress is less about understanding and liking each other and more about smashing structures that others defend.

Now the crucial barriers to racial justice are seen not just as individual, but as structural economic structures, the incarceration crisis, the breakdown of family structure.

using clean, renewable hydropower.

just from a couple of people

George Soros

The distractions no longer can mask these “unholy alliances.”

I am personally familiar with this group. Before they moved to their current, bigger ambitions of reversing the U.S. presidential election results, they scurrilously attacked me and others from the shadows for two decades

When you owe the world $18 trillion, the only way to get them to “pay 2 percent for defense” is to manufacture a boogeyman.

increase your defense budget to 2 percent

Technology and the disintegration of evidence-based journalism permit a surprisingly small number of individuals to destroy bilateral or multilateral relations.

the comedy movie “Wag the Dog,”

Oleg DeripaskaFounder of UC Rusal, a large Russian aluminum company

We sampled all rumor cascades investigated by six independent fact-checking organizations (snopes.com, politifact.com, factcheck.org, truthorfiction.com, hoax-slayer.com, and urbanlegends.about.com) by parsing the title, body, and verdict (true, false, or mixed) of each rumor investigation reported on their websites and automatically collecting the cascades corresponding to those rumors on Twitter.

According to one account, GCHQ’s then head, Robert Hannigan, passed material in summer 2016 to the CIA chief, John Brennan. The matter was deemed so sensitive it was handled at “director level”. After an initially slow start, Brennan used GCHQ information and intelligence from other partners to launch a major inter-agency investigation.

Special Counsel Mueller is believed to be investigating a different death that is possibly related to the dossier.

Robert Hannigan, then the head of the U.K.’s intelligence service the G.C.H.Q., had recently flown to Washington and briefed the C.I.A.’s director, John Brennan, on a stream of illicit communications between Trump’s team and Moscow that had been intercepted. (The content of these intercepts has not become public.)

There may not be a perfect culinary metaphor for the kind of country inclusive nationalists seek to create. But its contours should be obvious. It is a state in which all members have the same rights and opportunities irrespective of the group into which they are born or the culture to which they belong. It is a society in which people feel that they have something important in common because they seek to govern themselves together, pledge to help one another in an hour of need and recognize that these shared commitments are ultimately more consequential than any difference of color or creed. And it is a culture that does not shy away from celebrating the nobility of this collective identity — embracing the nation’s flag not because we claim never to have failed our compatriots in the past but because we aspire to realize a common future fair to all.

--

an elderly couple

But it didn’t single out anyone for that reason

we will identify, on a prospective basis, individuals who receive Disability Insurance benefits under title II of the Social Security Act (Act) or Supplemental Security Income (SSI) payments under title XVI of the Act and who also meet certain other criteria, including an award of benefits based on a finding that the individual's mental impairment meets or medically equals the requirements of section 12.00 of the Listing of Impairments (Listings) and receipt of benefits through a representative payee.

despite the White House’s insistence otherwise, the felonies that Manafort is accused of, and the two that Gates pleaded guilty to on Friday, bear directly on the question of Russian collusion.

Of course, Manafort wasn’t the only figure in Trump’s campaign with questionable Russian connections.

desperate straits

and some revelatory journalism

allowed his campaign to be infiltrated at the highest levels by both alleged and admitted criminals with Russian ties

VIDEO: GLENN GREENWALD AND JAMES RISEN DEBATE THE TRUMP/RUSSIA INVESTIGATION

the mere existence of this question underscores the need for a long overdue moratorium on the blithe characterization of things as “treason”— and for all of us to be far more careful when using that term to describe conduct that we believe is some combination of reprehensible, criminal and perhaps even impeachable.

But if a presidential candidate or his lieutenants secretly work with a foreign government that is a longtime adversary of the United States to manipulate and then win a presidential election, that is almost a textbook definition of treason.

But as far as embracing views far to the left or right, the Times’ full-time opinion writers have never represented a particularly wide range.

Charles J. Dunlap, Jr.

I have been authorized by the Department of Justice to confirm that the FBI, as part of our counterintelligence mission, is investigating the Russian government's efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election and that includes investigating the nature of any links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the Russian government and whether there was any coordination between the campaign and Russia's efforts. As with any counterintelligence investigation, this will also include an assessment of whether any crimes were committed.

The way they were raised? Something they saw on TV? Do they generally lack empathy?

a Plan to Help Distressed America

They could also deliver a windfall, in the form of avoided capital gains taxes, for corporations and financiers who invest in the Opportunity Zones.

Proponents say the new Opportunity Zones are designed to be more effective than earlier programs, and likely to generate far more investment than congressional scorekeepers predicted in assessing the tax bill.

Research suggests many previous federal attempts to increase investment in particular regions, such as Clinton-era Enterprise Zones, were largely ineffective.

The effort to create the zones was pushed by an upstart Washington think tank, the Economic Innovation Group, and its patron, the tech mogul Sean Parker, of Napster and Facebook fame, who enlisted Mr. Scott and others to sponsor the legislation.

If

attempt to grapple

“Opportunity Zones,” which will use tax incentives to draw long-term investment to parts of America that continue to struggle with high poverty and sluggish job and business growth

it’s been great to see you today.

special relationship between the UK and the United States

as you say, we’ve had a great discussion today

false rumor

I think the feeling is mutual from the standpoint of liking each other a lot

I can tell you it’s true.

great relationship

During formal phone calls between the two leaders, May finds it almost impossible to make headway and get her points across, one person familiar with the matter said. Trump totally dominates the discussion, leaving the prime minister with five or ten seconds to speak before he interrupts and launches into another monologue.

Although there are fewer earmarks since Congress adopted the earmark moratorium, far more money has been spent on average for each earmark, with no detailed information provided. In years past, individual locations (e.g., a bike path in a certain city) would appear next to the funding amount. The current trend sees members earmarking funding for an account that is responsible for that sort of spending (in this case, the Heritage Partnership Program), with the funding distributed later, without transparency or accountability.

Mr. Trump claimed, with no evidence, that “22 to 24 people came in through” the suspect in the Manhattan truck attack.

President Trump said late Thursday that he had canceled a trip to London because of the cost and “off location” of the new United States Embassy in the city, where he had been expected to face protests

And on Wednesday, Mr. Trump gave seemingly contradictory stances in a matter of seconds.

On Tuesday, in a meeting with a bipartisan group of lawmakers, Mr. Trump signaled a willingness to sign any deal worked out between Democrats and Republicans.“I mean, I will be signing it. I’m not going to say, ‘Oh, gee, I want this or I want that,’” he said. 59 Comments But by Tuesday night, Mr. Trump had declared on Twitter exactly what he wanted:

As they try to find a bipartisan solution on immigration, lawmakers have also had to try to decipher what exactly would be acceptable to Mr. Trump, given that he holds the veto pen.

some liberal Democrats are adamant that they will not vote for a government funding measure without a resolution on immigration

Mr. Trump’s positions vacillate daily.

ending the diversity visa lottery system

family-based migration

convened Tuesday’s session to address the fate of young undocumented immigrants

Trump’s recent overtures of bipartisanship

House Republicans’ Hard-Line Immigration Stand Clashes With Trump Overture

INGRAHAM: Will -- will you require that, if any amnesty talks will -- will require chain migration to end? TRUMP: I don't think any Republican would vote for anything having to do with leaving chain migration. Chain migration is a disaster for this country and it's horrible. I mean, just take a look at him. Twenty-three people -- potentially, 23 people... INGRAHAM: Is that verified? TRUMP: It's what I heard, it's what I gave. Whether it's 23 or whether it's two, as far as I'm concerned, it's too (ph) much (ph), OK?

Steele’s allegations — in addition to other information, including intelligence intercepts and an Australian diplomat’s account of a conversation with a Trump adviser in a London wine bar — prompted the FBI to open a counterintelligence investigation into Trump associates in July 2016, according to current and former officials. The Australian warning was first reported by the New York Times.

Current and former American and foreign officials with direct knowledge of the investigation say that the federal inquiry did not start with the dossier, nor did it rely on it. Rather, they have said, the dossier and the F.B.I.’s discussions with Mr. Steele merely added material to what American law enforcement and spy agencies were gleaning from other sources.

Critics of the federal investigation into claims President Donald Trump’s campaign colluded with the Russian government have latched onto a theory that the inquiry only began after the FBI received a controversial dossier funded by Democrats and littered with unproven allegations. But that, too, is unproven.

Mr. Mueller’s investigators have learned through witnesses and documents that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked the Trump transition team to lobby other countries to help Israel, according to two people briefed on the inquiry. Investigators have learned that Mr. Flynn and Mr. Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner, took the lead in those efforts. Mr. Mueller’s team has emails that show Mr. Flynn saying he would work to kill the vote, the people briefed on the matter said.

TELL Us THE TRUTH, UNCLE SAM (By John Barron)

There is little doubt that much of the orientation ofpost-secondary sports is sordid. After some reading about theregulators of ,the sports, I have little doubt that the various groupsengaged in promoting competitioh should have their motives, aswell as their modus operandi, analyzed.

We found that one in five of the coalition strikes we identified resulted in civilian death, a rate more than 31 times that acknowledged by the coalition. It is at such a distance from official claims that, in terms of civilian deaths, this may be the least transparent war in recent American history. Our reporting, moreover, revealed a consistent failure by the coalition to investigate claims properly or to keep records that make it possible to investigate the claims at all. While some of the civilian deaths we documented were a result of proximity to a legitimate ISIS target, many others appear to be the result simply of flawed or outdated intelligence that conflated civilians with combatants. In this system, Iraqis are considered guilty until proved innocent. Those who survive the strikes, people like Basim Razzo, remain marked as possible ISIS sympathizers, with no discernible path to clear their names.

But I want to say something very clearly, and this is going to be very disappointing to the people protesting the president and the people in Congress like Senator Schumer who have attacked the president for his lawful and necessary action.  The president's powers here are beyond question.  The president has the authority under the INA Section 8 U.S.C. 1182F to suspend the entry of aliens into this country.   And he has Article 2 foreign powers to also engage in conducting border control and immigration control into this country.  Those powers are substantial.  They present the very apex of presidential authority.  And so, we are contemplating new and additional actions to ensure that our immigration system does not become a vehicle for admitting people into our country who are hostile to this nation and its values.  

MILLER: It is dishonest. It is false. And it is wrong. And I will also say this because we talked a lot about the issue of judicial activism.  Sean, an unelected judge does not have the right to remake the immigration laws and policies for the entire United States of America. HANNITY: Well said. MILLER: This power is vested in the president. This was an issue put before 300 million American citizens, and they voted with their ballots in November to put in place new, tough vetting measures so that we don't end up like we see in parts of France and Germany and Belgium with a permanent problem of radicalism in our country, where it is a regular feature of our lives, where we have to spend hundreds of billions of dollars long-term dealing with the effect of an immigration system that is not properly controlled!

MILLER: Well, I think that it’s been an important reminder to all Americans that we have a judiciary that has taken far too much power and become in many case a supreme branch of government. One unelected judge in Seattle cannot remake laws for the entire country. I mean this is just crazy, John, the idea that you have a judge in Seattle say that a foreign national living in Libya has an effective right to enter the United States is -- is -- is beyond anything we’ve ever seen before.

Well we’re considering all of our options right now Chuck. That includes: you can continue the appeal in the ninth. You can seek an emergency stay at the Supreme Court. You can have a trial hearing on the merits at the district level. Or you can take in en banc for the emergency hearing also at the ninth circuit and yes, you could pursue additional executive actions. The bottom line is that we are pursuing every single possible action to keep our country safe from terrorism and I also want to be clear we’ve heard a lot of talk about how all the branches of government are equal. That’s the point. They are equal. There’s no such thing as judicial supremacy. What the judges did, both at the ninth and at the district level was to take power for themselves that belongs squarely in the hands of the president of the United States.

TRUMP:  I think the judge has been extremely hostile to me.  I think it has to do with perhaps the fact that I’m very, very strong on the border. Very, very strong on the border.  And he has been extremely hostile to me.   This is a case that in our opinion should have been won a long time ago.  It's a case we should have won on summary judgment.  We're nothing with this.  This is a very -- we have a very hostile judge.   Now, he is Hispanic, I believe.  He is a very hostile judge to me.  I said it loud and clear.

 And they’re taking away our weapons one by one, that’s what they’re doing.  And you know it and I know it, and you people have been very unhappy for a long period of time.

A clearly irritated Trump told his supporters to attack journalists who ask questions about the lawsuit and his comments about the judge."The people asking the questions-those are the racists," Trump said. "I would go at 'em."Suggesting a broader campaign against the media, Trump said the campaign should also actively criticize television reporters. "I'd let them have it," he said, referring to those who Trump portrayed as hypocrites.

We have a very hostile judge because to be honest with you the judge should have thrown the case out on summary judgment but because it was me and because there's a hostility toward me by the judge, tremendous hostility, beyond belief, I believe he happens to be Spanish, which is fine. He's Hispanic, which is fine, and we haven't asked for recusal which we may do but we have a judge who's very hostile. Should have been thrown out.

You know, you said something else about the judge yesterday. You said one of the judges, quote, “I believe he happens to be Spanish which is fine. He’s Hispanic, which is fine. We haven’t asked for a recusal which we may do.” Why would you need to ask for a recusal and what does his ethnicity have to do with it? DONALD TRUMP: Because I think he's been very, very unfair with us. I think the judge has been extremely unfair. This is a case that many, many, many people said should have been thrown out on summary judgment. We have 98 percent approval from the people that took it. CHUCK TODD: And you think it's because he's Hispanic? DONALD TRUMP: We have an A from the Better Business Bureau. This is a case that should've been-- well, because of the wall and because of everything that's going on with Mexico and all of that, I think it's frankly, look, this is a judge who I believe has treated me very, very unfairly. This is a case that should have been thrown out a long time ago, in the opinion of many great lawyers.

We also have to come up with punishment that's far quicker and far greater than the punishment these animals are getting right now. They'll go through court for years. And at the end, they'll be -- who knows what happens. We need quick justice and we need strong justice -- much quicker and much stronger than we have right now. Because what we have right now is a joke and it's a laughingstock. And no wonder so much of this stuff takes place.

GENERAL MCMASTER: What the President wants is to secure the American people from this threat and from mass murderers like this, murderers like this. And so what he's asked us for are options to take a look to assess if our tremendous law enforcement teams and our judicial system has all the tools they need to be able to combat this threat to the American people. So what we owe him now is we owe him options -- you know, options to take a look at to see if this is the time to reassess, change our capabilities in this area and the area of law enforcement in particular.

The only public statement occurred a year later when the Justice Department put out a little-noticed press release in August 2015, just days before Labor Day.

As of May 2, 2017, over 30 percent of the real estate transactions reported under the GTOs involved a beneficial owner or purchaser representative that had been the subject of unrelated Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs) filed by U.S. financial institutions. In other words, the beneficial owners or purchaser representatives in a significant portion of transactions reported under the GTO had been previously connected to a wide array of suspicious activities, including: • A beneficial owner suspected of being connected to over $140 million in suspicious financial activity since 2009 and who sought to disguise true ownership of related accounts. • Two beneficial owners (husband and wife) involved in a $6 million purchase of two condominiums were named in nine SARs filed from 2013 – 2016 in connection with allegations of corruption and bribery associated with South American government contracts.• A beneficial owner suspected of being connected to a network of individuals and shell companies that received over $6 million in wire transfers with no clear business purpose from entities in South America. Much of these funds were used for payments to various real estate related businesses. • Eleven SARs filed from 2008 through 2015 named either the buyer (an LLC), beneficial owner, or purchaser’s representative involved in a GTO-reported $4 million purchase of a residential unit. Law enforcement records indicate that both the purchaser’s representative and his business associate were associated with a foreign criminal organization involved in narcotics smuggling, money laundering, health care fraud, and the illegal export of automobiles

The relationship between corporate profits and worker compensation broke down in the late 1980s.

Republican political leaders these past six years have built up a massive, unprecedented credibility deficit, such that even their most straightforward assertions invite close bullshit inspection. By contrast, Democratic bullshit tends to center more around hypocrisy and political cowardice. Trying to find equivalency between the two would still be a mistake – and could lead to catty, inside-baseball gotcha journalism rather than genuine bullshit-calling.

Trump Lobs Praise, and Paper Towels, to Puerto Rico Storm Victims

it had its peculiar moments

She was not mollified after meeting him.

This time

Shortly after Mr. Trump departed the island, Governor Ricardo Rosselló told a news conference in San Juan that deaths related to Hurricane Maria had risen to 34.

they should be proud that only 16 people were known to have died in Hurricane Maria

“You can be very proud of your people and all of our people working together.”

“The first responders, the military, FEMA — they have done an incredible job in Puerto Rico,” Mr. Trump continued. “And whether it’s her or anybody else,” he said, referring to Mayor Cruz, “they’re all starting to say it.”

Trump, in Puerto Rico, Compares Death Toll to Katrina’s and Says Residents Should Be ‘Proud’

She wore a navy blue sweater and pants, and stiletto heels, as she left the White House. But, as on earlier trips, she changed while en route into more practical boots and her own baseball cap.

The president has gotten more comfortable with these visits,

In Puerto Rico, Mr. Trump’s schedule will limit his exposure to the public.

But the mayor of San Juan, Carmen Yulín Cruz, complained that the response in Puerto Rico fell short of that in Texas or Florida.

proud that only 16 people died in Hurricane Maria, compared with the “thousands” killed in “a real catastrophe like Hurricane Katrina.”

Melania Trump, the first lady, accompanied the president, as she has on previous visits to storm-ravaged areas. She wore a navy blue sweater and pants, and stiletto heels, as she left the White House. But, as on earlier trips, she changed while en route into more practical boots and her own baseball cap.

“I think she’s come back a long way,” the president said. “I think it’s now acknowledged what a great job we’ve done.” He asserted that the relief effort was as competent as those in Texas and Florida, and he added, “It’s actually a much tougher situation.”

If you look at the -- every death is a horror. But if you look at a real catastrophe like Katrina, and you look at the tremendous hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people that died, and you look at what happened here with, really, a storm that was just totally overpowering -- nobody has ever seen anything like this. What is your death count, as of this moment -- 17? PARTICIPANT: Sixteen certified. THE PRESIDENT: Sixteen people certified. Sixteen people versus in the thousands. You can be very proud of all of your people, all of our people working together. Sixteen versus literally thousands of people. You can be very proud. Everybody around this table and everybody watching can really be very proud of what's taken place in Puerto Rico.

Danny Sjursen

By not monitoring those financial instruments, investigators will miss out on most sales of new condos, said Alan Lips, a Miami accountant.

It’s also a hard truth that the window for having these debates is vanishingly small. We won’t be having any kind of public policy debate after this emergency subsides; the media will be back to obsessively covering Trump’s tweets and other palace intrigues. So while it may feel unseemly to be talking about root causes while people are still trapped in their homes, this is realistically the only time there is any sustained media interest whatsoever in talking about climate change. It’s worth recalling that Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris climate accord — an event that will reverberate globally for decades to come — received roughly two days of decent coverage. Then it was back to Russia round-the-clock.

(Thomas Johnson / The Washington Post)

For representing Yiannopoulos, the civil liberties group was widely accused of defending and enabling fascism.

formulated to ease the burden of those paying taxes rather than improve the lives of those receiving benefits

dozens of amendments

And he has embarked on a campaign to discredit the investigators before they can even get very far in their investigation, hoping to do to Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel, what the Clintons did to Kenneth W. Starr, the independent counsel.

Mr. Trump needed something substantive to prove he was making progress, according to White House aides.

The president — echoing his ill-received remarks about repealing the Affordable Care Act — has told people around him that he did not expect the process to be this difficult, according to one longtime adviser.

Mr. Trump is most concerned about being able to tell voters his plan hit the $1 trillion mark

Still, the broad outlines are slowly coming into focus. The plan would include “massive permit reform” to cut approval times on major projects to two years or less, from 10; loans and grants to improve rural infrastructure; and funding for “transformative projects,” like broadband and power grid improvements. In addition, the effort would include bolstering existing programs funded through the Finance and Innovation Act and new “incentives” to encourage states and localities to bankroll their own projects, officials said.

Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, is skeptical of wedding a tax overhaul and infrastructure — or of any deal that would require him to compromise with Democrats.

Its hybrid nature is its greatest virtue. It’s also a drawback. Democrats and centrist Republicans remain skeptical of its limited scope. House conservatives remain hostile toward any big, new federal funding program.

The collapse of his health care overhaul effort seemed to clear one item out of the way. But it also raised serious doubts about the ability of Republicans to pass anything other than regulatory rollbacks or routine spending bills.

has yet to produce the detailed plan he has promised to deliver “very soon,” and the president has yet to even name any members to a new board he claimed would green-light big projects

It awaits the resolution of tough negotiations over the budget, the debt ceiling, a tax overhaul, a new push to toughen immigration laws — and the enervating slog to enact a replacement for the Affordable Care Act.

fast becoming an afterthought

Trump’s ‘Great National Infrastructure Program’? Stalled

On the other hand, military commissions are also useful in the proper circumstances, and we need them, too. Those who denigrate these commissions must remember that, while federal courts can handle most terrorism prosecutions, in some cases, military commissions are not only appropriate, but also necessary to convict and neutralize terrorists. Last year, the Obama Administration spent a great deal of time and effort working with Congress to revise the commission rules to ensure that they are consistent with the rule of law. Congress has taken extraordinary steps to reform and improve these commissions since they were first introduced.

The truth is that the reformed commissions draw from the same Constitutional protections that underlie our civilian courts – the key difference being that, in commissions, evidentiary rules reflect the realities of the battlefield and the difficulties of conducting investigations in a war zone. I have faith in the framework and promise of our military commissions, which is why I’ve referred six cases to the reformed commissions for prosecution. And I expect to refer additional cases.

The U.S. Supreme Court then ruled in 1967’s Garrity v. New Jersey that the employees’ statements, made under threat of termination, were compelled by the state in violation of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments.  The decision asserted that “the option to lose their means of livelihood or pay the penalty of self-incrimination is the antithesis of free choice to speak or to remain silent.”   Therefore, because the employees’ statements were compelled, it was unconstitutional to use the statements in a prosecution.  Their convictions were overturned.

led to concerns about his mental status

Erik D. Prince, a founder of the private security firm Blackwater Worldwide,

Mr. Prince briefed several White House officials, including General McMaster, said a second person.

While he was at Blackwater, the company became involved in one of the most notorious episodes of the Iraq war, when its employees opened fire in a Baghdad square, killing 17 civilians.

Soliciting the views of Mr. Prince and Mr. Feinberg certainly qualifies as out-of-the-box thinking in a process dominated by military leaders in the Pentagon and the National Security Council. But it also raises a host of ethical issues, not least that both men could profit from their recommendations.

the readiness of this White House to turn to business people for help with diplomatic and military problems.

Trump Aides Recruited Businessmen to Devise Options for Afghanistan

crackdown sends chills

there is a tangible fear of the unknown. No one knows

there is tentative optimism that the Justice Department’s National Security Division is sufficiently insulated from political pressure by career prosecutors, and won’t bow to the pressure to be Trump’s attack dogs, should such a specific directive go out

The obsession with leaks that is acutely felt in the White House has clearly extended to the national security community.

constant leaking

Reince Priebus has repeatedly asked aides not to leak information at his 8 a.m. daily meeting, and the request has become something of a joke among other aides

the official stressed the majority of the information was unconfirmed rumor.

more aggressive tone